Busted!
It wasn't his idea. If it were up to him, he would be in his hotel room, getting ready for bed, like he was suppose to. Instead, his roommate had convinced him to go visits the girl's room down the hall.
Aang was on a cross country class trip to New York with other kids from his school. He spent the day visiting Times Square and walking around the various museums and monuments the Big Apple had to offer. Fueled only by the occasional fast food lunch break and a bag of cookies he bought earlier, Aang was exhausted. All he wanted to do was get some rest. He felt like jumping with joy when he saw the hotel they would be spending the night in. Just the thought of that comfortable mattress brought tears of joy to his eyes.
But was he in bed, getting some much needed rest?
Noooo.
Somehow, his roommate Sokka had convinced him that it was a good idea to sneak down the hall to the girl's room.
"I don't know about this, Sokka. If we get caught, we could get in a lot of trouble."
"Just relax, Aang. We'll hangout for, like, ten minutes, say goodnight, and leave."
It wasn't ten minutes. They hung out in Suki's, Katara's, and Toph's room for a the better part of an hour. Mostly they talked about what their favorite part of the day was. They laughed at Toph's rude jokes about Katara (I didn't know it was the boy's room and that Mr. Pakku was in there!), who made her own jokes about Toph (I was not afraid of the lightening in the lights show!). Overall, they were just being teenagers hanging out after a long and tiring day.
But they must've been louder than they thought because they heard someone knocking on the door.
- knock - knock - knock -
They all fell silent, shocked at the sudden interruption in their conversation.
"Who is it?" asked Katara.
"It's Ms. Kyoshi. Open up, girls."
Shocked turned into penetrating fear. Ms. Kyoshi was one of the chaperoning teachers. A kind and dependable woman, she also had a reputation among the students as one of the strictest teachers in the entire school. There was one rumor that said that she once beaten up a drunk man for making one of her students late. And then she gave the student detention for being late. Larger than most football players, she certainly could take down a full grown man. If she caught the boys in the girl's room, there would be serious consequences for all of them.
"Oh, crap," said Sokka in a scared and hushed voice. "What do we do? We're dead. So dead..."
"Quick, hide!"
Sokka and Aang began to run around the room like a couple of chickens with their heads caught off, desperate to find a place to hide.
"Oh man, we're dead...we're so dead. This is completely your fault," said Aang. He was careful to yell at Sokka quietly.
"My fault? You didn't have to come! I didn't force you here!"
"Yes you did! You grabbed my ears and pulled me all the way here! This is your entirely fault!"
"Well, maybe if your ears weren't so big I wouldn't have pulled you here!"
"Yeah, well...your ponytail makes you look like a girl!"
"It's a wolf's tail!"
"Would you two shut up?" Toph silently screamed at them.
- knock - knock - knock -
"Be right there," said Katara.
"Get under the bed," suggested Suki.
They dashed under the bed without a word, too scared of Ms. Kyoshi to debate. When every part of them was hidden from view, Katara opened the door.
Ms. Kyoshi came into the room. Aang and Sokka could only see Ms. Kyoshi's large feet enter the room from under the bed.
"What took you so long to answer the door?" Aang and Sokka could hear the suspicion in her voice.
"Umm...," said Suki.
"Well...," mumbled Katara.
"They were helping me in the bathroom. I fell down and couldn't get up." That was Toph. She always did have a talent for lying to teachers.
"Oh my. Are you all right?" Sounded like she bought it.
"Yeah. I'll probably be fine by tomorrow." She began to limp to her bed, putting a finishing touch on the lie.
"Well, I just wanted to see how you girls are doing."
To their horror, the six-foot teacher began to walk to their hiding spot. Oh god, she was right in front of them!
When she stopped, they released a released sigh.
Only to take a panic breath when she sat down on them. All 6'3 of her!
When she sat down on them, her feet just inches from their faces, they began to pray. To God, Buddha, Satan; at the moment, they weren't picky.
The boys didn't really hear the conversation that the girls were having. Their hearts were beating too for them to hear what was said. They only caught snippets of the conversation.
"The symbol with the stick person with the dress means is the girl's bathroom, Katara..."
"I hope you don't plan another 'unscheduled side-trip' to the arcade tomorrow, Ms. Bei Fong."
"Suki, I'd appreciate it if you and Sokka didn't disappear tomorrow for a third time."
Katara sounded worried, Suki tried her best to remain calm, and Toph couldn't stop giggling.
Basically, Ms. Kyoshi was just hanging out with the girls. She was probably bored and looking for someone to talk to. Eventually, Sokka and Aang stopped being scared and were just getting bored. Sokka got so bored, he started to collect lint from under the bed and form a really big fur ball. By the time Ms. Kyoshi finally got off the bed, it was as big as Aang's fist. Aang was pretty impressed by both the size of the fur ball and the maid's low cleaning standards.
Unfortunately, when Ms. Kyoshi stood up, her cell phone fell out of her pocket and bounced under the bed, centimeters from Aang's face. Ms. Kyoshi bended down and her hand started to wander around under the bed for the lost phone. At that moment, the heart beats of every student in the room stopped. Their spines went rigid, their breathing hitched, their skin paled, and their eyes bulged comically. Sokka was staring at the appendage like it was the bringer of doom (which it was).
Slowly, the teacher's hand began to drift closer and closer to Aang's face. Just when it seemed her hand would brush against the boy's nose and they would all get caught, Aang pushed the phone into her wandering hand. Feeling the hard metal, she grabbed it and retracted her hand.
A collective sigh escaped everyone.
"Well, I'll let you get to bed. Good night girls," Ms. Kyoshi said. She left the room without another word.
Nobody moved or said a word until they heard her door close from across the hall.
"Oh man, that was close," said Sokka with a grin as he climbed under out from under the bed.
"Tell me about it," replied Aang. "When she reached for the phone, I thought I was going to have a heart attack!" Aang was smiling too.
They didn't stay much longer afterwards. Aang and Sokka didn't feel like pushing their luck.
Just as they were closing the door of the room behind them, they saw somebody come out of the room right next to theirs. Sokka and Aang froze, thinking they had been busted. But instead of seeing an angry teacher, they saw a shocked Zuko.
"What are you doing out of your room,?" he asked suspiciously.
"Uuummm...nothing. What are you doing out of your room?" replied Sokka.
"Uuummm...I...am also doing nothing..."
"All right. We're all doing nothing."
"Okay, then..."
A moment of silence passed before anybody moved. A silent agreement had been made.
Zuko was the first to break the silence. "Good night." He walked past them to his room.
Aang and Sokka went to their room without a word.
Boy, they were going to be alot more careful the next time they snuck out.
What do you mean next time? We almost go caught!
But we didn't. Somebody up there's lookin' out for us.
A/N:
Believe it or not, this actually happened to me. Except for the part with the cell phone, it's all based on true events. I was on a class trip to New York and snuck down the hall to girl's room with my roommate (it was his idea). Only some girls from the other rooms came to hang out, too. I really did hide under the bed with my roommate (and praying to every God in existence, and few that we made up on the spot) and we did get sat on. Fortunately, the teacher was a lot smaller than Ms. Kyoshi.
On our way out, we ran into another guy sneak out of his girlfriend's room. We knew they were alone because the girlfriend's roommates were hanging out with us. Our conversation was similar to Zuko's and Sokka's.
We were more careful the next time we snuck out.